Visit of the HFR President to Milan and Cologne: significant handball agenda and important meetings
Last weekend was rich for sports events: finals of the Champions League in handball and football. The HFR President visited Milan and Cologne where he held several important meetings with the elite of the sports and business worlds, and with European handball officials.
Milan hosted the friendly football game between teams with code names “Inter” and “Milan”, organized by Alfa-Bank – the potential sponsor of the Handball Federation of Russia and the partner of Delo Group. The HFR President participated in the match by the invitation of Alfa-Bank and played for “Inter” together with Salvatore Schillaci – a claimer of the Golden Boot as the best goal scorer at the 1990 FIFA World Cup. And “Milan” was teamed with Filippo Inzaghi. “Inter” won the game 9:7. Sergey Shishkarev was chosen the MVP of the game with five assists.
“I tried to persuade Schillaci to assist me on the goals during the game, in Italian and in English, but he preferred to score goals with my assists”, – said Sergey Shishkarev after the game. Konstantin Genych commented on the game, a well-known sport analyst and commentator Nobel Arustamyan also visited the match. A lot of VIP came to play and support the friendly game, including Aleksandr Dukov, the president of GazpromNeft and football club Zenit.
During the game of Real and Atlético Madrid there was a chance to talk to executives of the European football, including Ilya Kovalchuk and the 2004 Golden Ball claimer Ukrainian football player Andrey Shevchenko.
On 28-29 of May Cologne opened doors for the 2016 EHF Men’s Champions League.
It was a grand event not only by the skill level of players but by organization as well, it was a real show that organizers gave to the fans. President of the Handball Federation of Russia visited matches by the EHF invitation. The agenda of these two days was rich for sporting and entertaining events.
“My visit to Cologne was enjoyable and fruitful due to the spectacular final and those important meetings I had. I’m sure that the final game between the clubs of Poland and Hungary should go into the handball study books. The intrigue we observed and the great success of the soviet player and coach Talant Duyshebaev should be studied by the future generations to know how to fight and how to make so called comebacks. Loosing 9 scores Polish “Kielce” managed not only to recoup but to win the Champions League”, – said Sergey Shishkarev after the final game.
Between the games the HFR President talked to the EHF President Jean Brihault about the EHF Congress that is to be held in November 2016 in Vienna. He supported Russia’s intentions to run for the Executive Committee membership. A discussion about our country’s role in development of the European handball was held with the EHF Secretary General Michael Wiederer. He is the only candidate for the EHF presidency at the moment.
Shishkarev, Wiederer and Konoplev discussed prospects of Russia and Belarus applying together to host the European Championship-2022, the Secretary General was interested by this idea. “We have also discussed the possibility of getting the additional place in the Champions League for the women’s club Rostov-Don, the conditions we have to meet and the additional arguments we need to present to the EHF in order to apply for this spot. Furthermore, we’ve talked about the possibility of applying for the participation of “Dinamo-Sinara” club in the EHF Cup this autumn. There’s also a range of regulations we have to abide together with the club so that our supplication was reviewed”, – Sergey Shishkarev shared the details of the discussion.
The HFR President invited Michael Wiederer to visit Russia this summer.
Further on, Sergey Shishkarev also met the Chairman of the Belarus Handball Association Vladimir Konoplev, the Secretary General of the Latvian Handball Federation Anrijs Brencans, the President of the Polish Handball Federation and the Olympic Committee Andrzej Krasnicki, the President of the German Handball Federation Andreas Michelmann and the Secretary General Mark Schober. During these meetings the colleagues discussed questions on the current development of the European handball, the upcoming matches, preparations for Rio Olympic Games and the future EHF Congress where Russia and the CIS states will present mutual candidatures for the EHF office.
On the eve of qualification for the World Men’s Handball Championship-2017, the games between Russia and Montenegro will be held on 12th and 15th of June in Moscow and Montenegro respectively, the presidents of both federations met to discuss the games and invited each other for home games.
Sergey Shishkarev also discussed the final in Cologne with Dmitry Torgovanov, the head coach of the men’s national team. They have overviewed the tactics and strategy of the outstanding Final4 games and the upcoming training camp of our team in Novogorsk, preparations for the game with Montenegro. Our team will also have a game in Germany, where it will play with the current European Champion – quite a challenge for our men.
Cologne was a welcoming city in terms of festival events, spectacular battles and fruitful meetings and discussion.
